


Listen here. I've never played it safe.

by jehans



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: AU-gust 2020, Alternate Universe, Bad Decisions, Christian Mythology, Fallen Angels, Ficlet Collection, Grey's Anatomy References, Hospital Sex, M/M, Married idiots, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:01:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25704793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jehans/pseuds/jehans
Summary: A series of prompt fills for the AU-gust 2020 challenge.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 9
Kudos: 37
Collections: AUgust 2020





	1. Soulmate AU: "Alive With Color"

**Author's Note:**

> Rating, tags, and warnings all could change, so keep an eye out!
> 
> Come hang with me on Twitter @apblaidd

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone always says that the most exciting moment in a person’s life is the moment they meet their soulmate. Steve disagrees.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter rating: G  
> Chapter warnings: None
> 
> Day Three: Soulmate AU
> 
> I told myself these would all be 500 words and under. I have already spectacularly failed.

Everyone always says that the most exciting moment in a person’s life is the moment they meet their soulmate. That watching the world suddenly come alive with color, and knowing for the first time that you’re not alone in life anymore, is the greatest feeling you will ever know.

Steve never got that moment. Or, at least, not that he can remember. He doesn’t remember _ever_ seeing the world in shades of grey.

Growing up, people always told him he was _lucky_. “That means you already know your soulmate!” they’d say, metaphorical hearts shining in their eyes, overlooking the obvious.

Yes, everyone has at least one soulmate. But Steve has always known that not everyone actually _finds_ theirs. Some people never get to see in rainbows, and some, like him, see them too soon; ships passing before they have even the capability to reach out to each other.

His only real comfort was knowing what his mother told him countless times when he would pout: that romantic relationships are not the end-all-be-all of happiness, that plenty of people live joyous, fulfilling lives without ever knowing who their soulmate is, and that plenty of people even fall in love and have long, happy relationships without ever seeing anything but grey. At _least_ three other kids in Steve’s elementary school were in the same boat as him. Including Steve’s best friend.

For reasons that Steve will never truly be able to explain, even to himself, it genuinely never occurred to him that _Bucky_ could be his soulmate. Not as children, when they compared colors and talked about never knowing anything different, and not in high school, when he started falling in love with his charming, charismatic best friend, who could make every girl in school (and Steve) swoon with the force of a single smile. No, he just hoped and prayed with all his heart that maybe someday, he and Bucky could have one of those extra-soulmate relationships that might have a chance to last.

Even in college, when they were hanging out on some mundane Tuesday night, talking over the TV, and out of the blue, Bucky made a small, wounded sound and launched himself across the sofa, landing haphazardly in a very startled Steve’s lap as he slotted their lips together in a desperate, hungry kiss — a kiss that quickly evolved into the two of them making out in only their underwear, with Bucky lying on his back on the sofa, under Steve’s warm bulk — even _then_ , Steve didn’t understand.

He didn’t find out until they’d been dating for two months, and, unable to hold it in another moment, Steve finally told Bucky that he loved him, and had for the last four years, and Bucky immediately burst into tears.

It took a while for Bucky to stop sobbing with joy and relief — as Steve tried to contain his alarm while rubbing Bucky’s back comfortingly — but when he pulled himself to together, Bucky confessed that he’d been lying every time he told Steve he couldn’t remember what the world looked like in greyscale.

Steve hadn’t even been a year old yet, but Bucky had been a few months past two when his mom met Steve’s and brought him over for a play date. Bucky’d leaned out of his mother’s arms to look into the crib where Steve was asleep, and suddenly all he saw was golden hair and pink skin and the baby blue blanket Steve was swaddled in. It’s a hazy memory, and one of his first, but Bucky has always remembered how it happened.

“Why didn’t you ever tell me?” Steve asked wildly, Bucky’s tear-soaked cheeks cradled in both his hands, and Bucky shook his head.

“I’ve been in love with you my whole life, Stevie,” he wept. “You didn’t feel that way about me back then, and I couldn’t _bear_ the thought that you were my soulmate, but I might not be yours.”

“Oh, _honey_ ,” Steve sighed then, pulling Bucky into his arms.

And when Bucky turned his face into the crook of Steve’s neck, smearing happy tears across his skin, and told him, “ _God_ , Stevie, I love you so much,” Steve couldn’t stop himself from crying, too.

So, no, Steve can’t say he agrees with what everyone always says. Not at all. Meeting his soulmate wasn’t the greatest feeling he’s ever known — he wasn’t even _awake_ for it. Even realizing that Bucky has been his all along, while fucking _incredible_ , wasn’t the most exciting moment of his life.

No. As he sits in his living room, book in hand and his best friend’s legs draped over his lap, watching his husband of fifteen wonderful, stressful, exhilarating years furrow his eyebrows and stick the tip of his tongue out as he knits his way through a particularly challenging section of the blanket he’s making, Steve knows. He sees it in the grey hairs sparkling at Bucky’s temples and in his beard, the laughter lines Steve got to watch form in real time, the truly specific shade of blue that Steve has come to regard as his favorite color shining towards him as Bucky glances over his knitting to see what the hell his husband is staring at.

This is it: the most exciting moment of his life. This, and the hundreds of thousands of other moments just like this that they’ve shared, sprinkled throughout their entwined lives. And knowing with deep certainty that they will get hundreds of thousands more — _that_ , as far as Steve Rogers-Barnes is concerned, is the greatest feeling he will ever know.


	2. Angel & Demons AU: "Cornflower Blue"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You thought the Father would save you. Bring you back into His arms, gather you up like that lost sheep He’s always talking about, and give you back your wings.
> 
> There was nothing that could have warned you. You didn’t anticipate this, either.
> 
> He doesn’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter rating: T  
> Chapter warnings: None
> 
> Day Four: Angels & Demons AU
> 
> Well, at least this one's a _little_ shorter.

It’s true, what they told you. Demons are only angels who fell from Grace. It’s also true that the falling, for them, has always been a choice. A decision to plunge headfirst out of the arms and the will of the Father. What you didn’t understand, before you plummeted that descent yourself, is that the falling is less metaphorical than you were expecting, that your wings — your precious, lovely wings, as much a part of your body as your arms — would burn to ash around you as you fell, that it would hurt worse than death.

But you didn’t choose. This wasn’t your choice. You were attacked — caught by Lucifer’s kin and wrestled to the ground, thrown over the edge to your fate. You thought the Father would save you. Bring you back into His arms, gather you up like that lost sheep He’s always talking about, and give you back your wings.

There was nothing that could have warned you. You didn’t anticipate this, either.

He doesn’t.

When you finally catch His ear, begging to be brought back home, He tells you no. That He can’t.

That He won’t.

_Fallen Ones cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven_ , he says. He at least has the decency to appear grieved. But then, just like that, he’s gone.

And you have been abandoned.

Until.

The third and final thing you didn’t expect happens only hours of mortal time after the Father rejects you. Another angel falls, burning through the sky toward you like a star through the atmosphere. You watch this one jump, watch them choose, though you can’t see who it is.

It isn’t until he’s about to crash that you recognize him.

You jump to your feet when you see him, hurtling in the direction of his fall, but you don’t make it in time to catch him, even if you could. You skid to a halt beside him, throwing yourself down and pulling the charred remains of him into your arms and weeping for his damnation, even more than you wept for your own.

But his eyes flutter open and he fixes you with cornflower blue. He _smiles_ , and says your name like he still loves you.

And you weep, and you say his name, too.

“What did you _do?_ ” you demand, casting around through your tears to see if they’re coming for you yet.

You snuck out, stole away, you’re not supposed to be here. Lucifer’s kin have surely noticed your absence by now, and they’ll be finding you soon, you’re sure. They’ll take you both and enslave you for the rest of eternity.

But he reaches up to touch your face, and you look back down at him, and his strength is beginning to return because he pushes up out of your arms, his hand warm on your face, and his lips find yours.

You sigh into his kiss. The moment they threw you over, your first thought wasn’t about the Father at all, it was about _him_. Your first thought as you fell was that you were never going to get to kiss him again. But here he is, impossibly, kissing you.

“What did you do?” you ask again, but weaker this time, just a breath against his breath, your lips brushing his lips.

“I came to get you,” he tells you simply, like that could _possibly_ be simple. Like he didn’t just damn himself eternally for _you_.

“You can’t take me back,” you tell him like you’re trying to argue a choice he’s already made. “You can’t go back at all. They’re gonna be here any second, they’re gonna take us—”

“Then let’s go,” he interrupts you, strong enough now to stand, pulling you up with him, and he kisses you again before he continues, like he can’t help it. “We’ll pose as humans, build a life together. I don’t want to be anywhere you can’t be. I love you. Come on, quickly, before they find us, let’s go!”

And you look into his cornflower eyes, fixed so intently on yours as he tells you he still loves you even with what you are, now. And for the first time since the fall, you smile.

“Okay,” you agree, watching his face light up like the sun. You don’t need the Father, not when you have him. “Okay, let’s go.”

And you do.


	3. Hospital AU: "Grey's Anatomy May Have Had A Bad Influence On You"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Steve, this is fucking stupid.”
> 
> “They do it on Grey’s Anatomy all the time!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter rating: M  
> Chapter warnings: None
> 
> Day Six: Hospital AU
> 
> [Yesterday's ficlet (Modern AU joker) became a full-fledged fic, and is available to read here!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25744288)

“Steve, this is fucking stupid.”

“They do it on _Grey’s Anatomy_ all the time!”

“Yeah, well, on _Grey’s Anatomy_ , they also use defibrillators when they should be doing chest compressions, let first-year residents do surgeries, completely ignore that nurses exist, and 3D print internal organs.” Bucky grunts as his back hits the wall then hisses, “We’re gonna get arrested!”

“No, we’re not,” Steve tells him dismissively, like Bucky is being _overdramatic_ in saying they are. “Get your shirt off!”

“I am, I am!” Bucky sighs, because he is, of course he is. The second Steve silently pulled him into an on-call room, Bucky knew he was gonna go along with whatever Steve wanted, even if it _is_ the stupidest thing he’s ever done. He’s a _doctor_ for chrissakes, he should really be more professional than this. But tell him, how the _fuck_ is he supposed to look at Steve’s golden hair and huge blue eyes, framed by blackest-black eyelashes, and say _no?!_ He can’t. And Steve seems to know he can’t. So here he is, pressed up against a wall in a dark on-call room, shrugging out of his lab coat while Steve makes quick work of his shirt buttons.

It’s just a good thing he’s not in scrubs, Bucky thinks as Steve’s mouth latches onto his neck and starts sucking, because this is not at _all_ sterile. His shirt is off and Steve is working on his pants, and despite himself, he’s trying to strip Steve of his clothes, too.

“No marks!” Bucky scolds urgently at the scrape of Steve’s teeth, but there’s way less heat in it than he means there to be, and he already sounds halfway wrecked, which Steve is definitely smug about. Steve doesn’t respond, but he does duck down lower, to Bucky’s clavicle, and starts sucking a bruise there instead, where at least Bucky’s shirt will hide it.

By the time Bucky is naked and Steve has only underwear left, on his knees in between Bucky’s at the edge of the bed, Bucky is sporting three fresh hickeys on his chest, and trying not to whine as Steve presses deliberate, open-mouthed kisses along the line of his cock.

“I can’t— _ngh!_ —believe you got me naked— _ah_ —at _work!_ ” Bucky complains ineffectually. Steve chuckles around his dick, and it’s deeply upsetting. “We fucking— _mmph_ — _live_ together— _Jesus!_ We could have just done this at home!” he finally finishes as Steve pops off of his cock to look up at him with a very ‘ _Are you going to keep talking the_ entire _time your dick is in my mouth?’_ expression on his face.

When it’s clear that Bucky is done, now glaring down at Steve (either because he’s put out that Steve got him in here in the first place or that Steve isn’t currently sucking his cock anymore, he doesn’t know), Steve just smiles rakishly and shrugs.

“You married me,” is all he says before swallowing Bucky down all the way to the hilt.

And. Well. Yes. Yes, Bucky did marry him. And right now, as he starts bucking his hips just a little bit, he’s remembering _exactly_ why he did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In my mind in this AU, Steve is an obstetrician and Bucky is a pediatric surgeon. They work at the same hospital. Steve is on call overnight and wants some lovin' from his hubby to tide him over in case he has to stay at the hospital all night without Bucky (who will be asleep because he is not on call).


	4. Crime AU: "If Things Were Different"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve is the head of a respected Irish crime family. Unfortunately, he fell in love with his bodyguard shortly after Bucky joined the family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter rating: G  
> Chapter warnings: None
> 
> Day Twelve: Crime AU
> 
> Eh, I do what I want!

“Boss.”

Steve Rogers sniffs and blinks. The haze of whisky is still strong, casting a shadow of confusion over his consciousness, so that all he’s aware of is that he’s lying face-down over his desk, and he’s being roused by warm hands on his face.

“Boss,” his rouser says again, a soft voice that Steve instantly recognizes now that he’s not caught in the throes of a nightmare.

“Bucky?” he mumbles, and the gently smiling face of Steve’s personal bodyguard swims into view. “Buck. You’re not s’posed—”

“I know,” Bucky says simply, pulling Steve up off the desk and out of his chair. Steve slumps against Bucky’s strong sturdiness, and an arm circles his waist.

“Buck, y’can’t be in here,” Steve slurs through the drunken sleepiness that’s threatening to drag him under again.

“I’m not,” Bucky tells him, and then starts walking him out of his office.

Steve is the head of a respected Irish crime family, his office is absolutely off-limits to his staff unless they’ve been explicitly invited, and as much as Steve longs to have Bucky in here all the time, that wouldn’t be appropriate for someone in his position. So Steve works in his office, and Bucky waits outside, keeping watch.

Unfortunately, Steve fell in love with Bucky shortly after Bucky joined the family. Most of the time, he doesn’t even let himself entertain thoughts about his feelings. Not even when Bucky’s eyes crinkle in secret smiles he sends toward Steve. Not even when his hands twitch toward Steve before he drops them back to his sides.

But on nights like tonight, when Steve drinks himself stupid, when he drinks to stop thinking, he can’t help it. He wonders, on nights like tonight, if things were different — if he wasn’t Bucky’s boss — could Bucky ever love him, too? Could he look at Steve and see someone worth loving, and not just a man with rivers and oceans of blood on his hands?

_Could you love me?_

Bucky bends, slipping Steve into his bed and guiding him down until he’s tucked in. Steve never realizes, when he’s like this, that his thoughts don’t stay silent. That he tends to speak everything he’s thinking out loud.

 _Could you love me?_ he asked. How does he not know?

As Steve’s eyes flutter shut, Bucky can’t help but smooth his golden flop of hair off of his face, lean down to brush his lips over his damp forehead.

“I already do,” he whispers, then goes to take his post.


End file.
